


A Yearly Pain

by Willow_Of_Vanaheim



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jotunn | Frost Giant, Menstruation, Not Canon Compliant, Sick Loki (Marvel), Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-23
Updated: 2018-10-23
Packaged: 2019-08-06 11:18:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16386842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Willow_Of_Vanaheim/pseuds/Willow_Of_Vanaheim
Summary: After touching the Casket Of Winters Loki's physiology begins to change. He starts menstruating but manages keeps it a secret from everyone. What happens when, still clueless about this new bodily function, he starts bleeding while on Midgard.





	A Yearly Pain

**Author's Note:**

> A fluffy one-shot story about Loki on his period. I've defiantly fugded how Jotunn anatomy works, so please just ignore the inaccuracies. I hope you enjoy reading this.

Dust settled on the floor as Loki, alongside the rest of the Avengers, assisted with the clean up after the last battle. The announcement came only a month earlier that Loki was joining them, although they’d teamed up before that. The disclosure allowed him to be in the public eye. His appearance alongside the team was always met with suspicion. No one trusted him.

Today he was thankful for that. It meant no one was paying close attention to him. He was having cramps so bad that he’d had to find a corner to curl up in. The worst of it was that he knew if he turned into his Frost Giant form then the preliminary pain would go away. But he couldn’t face doing that. 

His Frost Giant heritage meant his body menstruated once a year. It had only started the first time he’d revealed his form when he’d taken the casket. So five cycles total. He didn’t have much practice with these things and in the other situations, ruling Asgard before throwing himself into the void then the years after when he’d been held captive by the Chitauri, or last years when he’d been being tortured in a prison cell, well those situations something worse was always happening.

The first round of cramps was his body tearing itself apart so the blood had an exit. Then followed three weeks of misery. At first, he’d been confused and scared not understanding the changes to his body until he’d been able to do some research once pardoned. He didn’t quite know what to do. No one knew he hadn’t even told Thor yet.

A particularly strong wave of pain hit him and he cried out curling up further. He’d felt the skin behind his balls beginning to tear open. The research he had done showed that Frost Giants were both sexes, were intersex. In his Asgardian form, Loki was completely male. Upon finding out he thought that explained some of his more ‘womanly tendencies’ as everyone on Asgard had put it. Loki learned a lot about Asgard’s ridiculous gender stereotyping through those taunts.

He could hear Steve calling them all over now that the clean up was complete. Loki took several deep gasping breaths and wobbled to his feet, leaning heavily on the wall. Attempting composure he struggled over to where Steve was giving a speech to the gathered authorities about teamwork and a job well done and other nonsense. Then the Avengers were leaving with Loki trailing along behind.

He grit his teeth, trying to bear with the pain, extremely grateful when they boarded the quinjet. He took a seat by himself away from where the others were tiredly chatting. Only his brother approached and he warded him off by pretending to snooze. His head by this point was pounding and he could feel a migraine coming on, so he elected to keep his eyes closed as the lights hurt. 

When they arrived he stumbled his way to the room Tony had assigned him. He still couldn’t think of it as his room. Turing all the lights off he crawled his way into bed, curling into the fetal position. He didn’t sleep, not really. More like he lay in a haze of pain trying not to drown under it. 

At one point Jarvis called him saying dinner was ready and Loki slurred back that he was not hungry. He then came to again a few hours later and dragged himself out of bed and into the bathroom. He tossed off his clothes, leaving them as a pile to be dealt with tomorrow. He began rummaging around in the cabinet, looking for painkillers even knowing full well Midgardian medication did nothing for him. He was desperate enough to try anything. His hand clapped over a small bottle and he gulped down a handful of them before dragging himself back to bed where he fell asleep not waking until late the next morning.

He was assaulted by a different type of pain this time, the dull cramping ache that made him not want to move ever again. Knowing that he would bleed all over the bed if he didn’t get up gave him the motivation to do so. Groaning he rolled over and sat up. Immediately his head started spinning and he sat for a while, one hand on his head, one on his stomach.

Somehow he managed to drag himself to the bathroom, where he sat on the toilet and saw that there was blood covering his thighs. After cleaning himself up he looked around the bathroom for anything he could use to catch the blood that was already flowing heavily.

In the end, he stuffed a folded flannel into his boxers and wrapped tissue around it. He hoped it would hold for a couple of hours while he could find what the Midgardian’s used to avoid making a mess. Loki nearly asked Jarvis for advice but found that his mouth refused to for the embarrassing words. Instead, he decided he would go out to find the item on his own. First, though he needed money.

He sought Tony Stark out, finding him in his lab. Tony permitted him inside after Jarvis announced him.

“Hey Reindeer Games, what can I do for you this fine sunny morning.”

It was afternoon and cloudy. 

“I require money.” Tony raised an eyebrow as Loki got straight to the point.

“Can I ask why?”

“There’s something I need. It’s none of your business.” Loki hunched over slightly, his stomach and lower back in agony, his voice tight with the strain.

“Okay.” Tony dragged the word out, he sounded suspicious. “How much do you need?” 

“I’m not sure. £20? I don’t know what I need exactly and am unsure of the precise cost.”

Both men stood looking at each other for a while before Tony reached his hand into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He found a £20 note scrunched in the bottom. He handed it to Loki saying, “You’re lucky I had that on me, I don’t normally carry cash.”

Loki nodded his thanks and headed out of the workshop. Tony watched him walk away and spent a few minutes just staring at the metal in front of him before he put down his tools and asked Jarvis to pull up the tracker on Loki. The Loki-dot was en route to the mall. Tony quickly made his way to follow.

Loki wasn’t making very quick progress. He kept getting overwhelmed by waves of pain and having to sit down or lean against a wall, waiting for it to pass. At one point he even slumped onto the pavement when he felt he was about to pass out. It took five minutes for his head to stop spinning. Maybe it was because he was relatively new to this or because it had been suppressed for so long, but Loki didn’t remember the women of Asgard suffering so when they had their bleed.

Finally, he made it the shopping center. Looking around he couldn’t decide where would be the best place to start his hunt. The first place he tried was a women’s clothing shop. He assumed that there was a special type of underwear that needed to be worn, but after hunting around for half an hour and nearly passing out again he concluded that this shop didn’t sell what he needed.

Unknown to Loki, Tony had been following him around, his confusion growing. His first thought when Loki had asked for cash had been that he was buying drugs. That was his main reason for following him though he began to doubt that when Loki had turned into the mall and not into some back alley. He suspicious had decreased but he was still wary about what Loki was doing. Concerned grew every time he double over or swayed on his feet. Each time Tony nearly ran over to help him but his curiosity held him back. 

The next place that Loki tried was a shop named ‘Mother & Baby’. His logic here was that they would sell everything to cater to a women needs but upon entering he was surrounded by tiny clothing, wooden toys and many many different pushchairs. Being the only male in the shop he immediately attracted the attention of the sales assistants. The twos girls were asking how they could assist him. Loki tried to back out politely but they were quite insistent. In the end, he answered.

“I am looking for something to stop the bleeding.” Both of the sales assistants looked at each other with a knowing look.

“If I had a dollar for every guy that came in here looking for pads, well I wouldn’t need to work here anymore.” The one with the pink hair rolled her eyes muttering about clueless men.

“Ignore her.” The one with the bun spoke this time. “We don’t stock pads or tampons, you can find those in the pharmacy.”

She took him to the door and pointed across the way. 

“You might want to pick up chocolates and painkillers as well. She’ll like that.” She smiled at him and he thanked them both, bowing slightly before discovering that was a very bad idea indeed. As he made his way over to the pharmacy he noticed two things. The first and most pressing was that the flannel was getting sodden. He worried that it would soon overflow. And the second he might have imagined, but he was sure he felt someone following him as soon as he had left the shop.

Tony, was indeed still following Loki. After he entered the second shop, Tony was convinced he was having a secret affair. He’d stayed outside and started looking up all the women that Loki could have had contact with long enough to knock up. He barely had time to hide again when Loki exited only five minutes after he went in.

The wave of cool air that washed over Loki as he entered the pharmacy was very welcome. Now he need only purchase the things that sales assistant had suggested and he could curl up in bed once more. The chocolates were the easiest to find, as little stands were placed strategically at the end of every aisle. He kept glancing over his shoulder, certain now that he was being followed but not letting it bother him.

He ran into the first problem when he came to the pain meds. It was all the same stuff that was stocked in the bathroom back at Tony’s tower. This stuff did nothing for him at all, he wanted to bang his head against the shelf in frustration. Instead, he took a deep breath, grabbed a box anyway and began searching for the elusive ‘pads and tampons’.

He found them at last in an aisle labeled feminine hygiene. Just as he was about to inspect the goods he saw a flash of movement out of the corner of his eyes. Silently he backed up and stepped out.

“Anthony!”

“Oh hey, rock of ages. Fancy seeing you here. Wow, what a coincident.” Tony awkwardly shoved his hands into his pockets.

“Do not lie to the God of lies. Why are you following me?”

“Hey, you were the one acting weird. I thought you were buying drugs or something. £20 is not enough for drugs and I didn’t want you to get your ass kicked. But how knew, little Loki has a girlfriend!” Tony’s tone was teasing and Loki shook his head at the mortals' foolish assumptions. He was not in the mood. He was aching, sweaty, dizzy and nauseous.

“Make yourself useful and help me find what I need, now that you’re here.” Loki gestured to the intimidating shelf of products. 

Tony stepped up and scanned the shelf with one hand on his chin.

“What does she prefer?” For a moment Loki’s sluggish brain wondered who the she was that people kept referring to. Then he realized that it wasn’t any more normal for a man to menstruate on Midgard than it was on Asgard. Loki was happy enough to let Tony believe it was for some women, at least then he wouldn’t have to explain that he was, in fact, a disgusting Frost Giant.

“I don’t know. Is there a difference?” Loki asked wearily, leaning against the shelf as the world spun around him.

“Well one collects the blood outside, the other goes up there.” He made a crude gesture before shrugging.

Loki thought for a moment but that moment was obviously too long as Tony flagged down one of the sales assistants dressed in lime green.

“Hey there beautiful. Do you reckon you can help us, we don’t know what to get?” The girl blushed slightly at Tony’s address and Loki rolled his eyes.

“Do you know the ladies preference?”

“We don’t I’m afraid sweetheart.”

“Then I’d go with pads, just to be safe.” She pointed to a row of brightly coloured plastic-wrapped squares. “Is the flow particularly heavy?”

She looked to Tony, and Tony looked to Loki for an answer.

“Uh yeah. Very.” He muttered, thoroughly embarrassed as Tony waggled his eyebrows at him. The girl picked out two boxes of heavy-duty winged pads. 

Tony picked them up and thanked her for her help. Just as she was walking away Loki called after her. “Do you have any stronger painkillers than these?” 

As Loki held up the box Tony noticed that his hand was shaking. Tony liked playing detective and he still hadn’t given up on his drugs idea. The sales assistant glanced at the medications telling Loki that he could only get stronger with a prescription from a doctor. Loki looked thoughtful for a moment.

“Hey Tony, you’re a doctor aren’t you?”

“Of science.” Tony chuckled. “I’m sure Bruce can write you one if you really need it.” 

Tony watched in fascination as a look of relief crossed Loki’s face. What was going on, he wondered. Loki snuck a box of tampons off the shelf too, just in case, then was heading towards the till and Tony jogged slightly to catch up. There was no queue so they were out of the shop quickly, falling into step beside each other.

“Did you drive?” Loki asked. Tony replied in the negative to which Loki mumbled, “then what’s the use of you being here.”

“To be noisy. Are you going to your girlfriends now?”

“What?” Loki was too tired to be truly exasperated.

“Why else would you be buying those supplies?”

“I thought Thor made it explicitly clear that I didn’t like women?” Loki’s cheeks reddened.

“I thought he was just teasing you.” Loki shrugged, not deeming Tony with an answer, just picking up the pace. He hadn’t gotten very far ahead when white-hot point struck him again. He leaned sideways against the nearest wall, willing the world to stop spinning. He felt a tightness in his throat and vomited just as Tony caught up with him. A hesitant hand brushed his back before withdrawing. 

By this point Loki could feel the blood soaking down the thighs of his trousers, he just hoped it was hidden by his long coat. As his head stopped spinning he noticed that Tony was nattering on about goodness knows what.

“Please shut up, I just wish to get back.” Loki's words were half hissed through gritted teeth. As he stood the world went dark for a moment. He blinked his eyes clear and found that Tony was holding him up. 

“There’s a little park just around the corner, come sit down for a bit.” Tony tugged at Loki’s elbow until he started walking.

As they sat down, the flannel made a squelch, the overflowing blood spilling onto Loki’s skin. Subtly he touches his hand to his crotch and it came away covered in red. Loki could smell the metallic tang and was worried that Tony could too. Right now his mind waged an internal war over whether he wanted a bath or a nap more.

“Okay speak Reindeer Games, what’s up?” Tony had sat next to him.

“It’s really none of your business.” Loki waved his hand to shoo the inventor off but Tony caught his wrist.

“You’re bleeding. Where are you injured? Are you… Oh.” Loki could see Tony’s thought process written across his face. He was putting together Loki’s purchases with his odd behavior and now the blood. Tony’s face turned a brilliant scarlet as he let go of Loki’s hand. “I didn’t realize.”

“I wish to return to the tower. I’m very uncomfortable.” Loki kept his tone clipped, not allowing his words to betray the humiliation he felt. He hadn’t wanted anyone to know. Not even Thor knew. But now Tony had found out and this was going to be it for the place he’d fought so hard to secure for himself. 

“Yeah of course. Do you want me to call a car? I can get…”

“Please shut up, my head is killing me. I’m perfectly capable of walking, you don’t have to treat me like an invalid.” Loki got up and swept away, painfully aware he’d left a trail of blood on the bench. He felt light-headed but powered on, not wanting to discuss this any further. He knew he was a freak, he didn’t need anyone to point it out for him. Especially not right now, he didn’t feel in control of his emotions and was dangerously close to breaking down in tears. 

Tony caught up with him when they were near to the towers gates. If it wasn’t for his presence Loki knew he would have crawled into an ally and called it a night, but with Tony’s eyes on him, he felt as if he had a point to prove. He wasn’t weak. He didn’t need help.

Once inside he got straight into an elevator and up to his assigned room. As soon as he was alone he slumped down, let the whimpers of pain fall from his lips. His lower region looked like a murder scene when he peeled his clothing off. He would have to through them away. As well as the flannel which flopped to the floor with a sickening thud, the tissue all but disintegrated. 

Loki turned the shower on, extra hot, he was taking no chances of his true nature showing through. He stayed in there until he was having trouble standing at which point he stumbled out. He’d left everything on the bedroom floor, so he shrugged a dressing gown on and wondered out. He nearly had a heart attack when he saw Tony sitting on his bed.

“What are you doing.” He hissed.

“I was worried about you and I brought you this.” Tony held out an empty hot water bottle. “To help with the cramps.”

“I’m not in the mood to deal with this right now. Kindly leave.” Loki didn’t touch the offered bottle. He was sure that Tony was mocking him, why else would he be here.

“Okay, I will, but you need any help first?” Loki raised his eyebrow. “You didn’t even know what you were buying, do you know how they work?”

“My intellect is far superior to your’s mortal.” 

“Prove it.”

“Fine.” Dammit, he had been pulled into that one. He really wasn’t on top of his game right now.

Loki picked up one of the packets, the brightly coloured plastic wrapped one. When he ripped into it fourteen individually wrapped flat rectangles fell out over the floor. Loki looked unsure so Tony picked up the tampons and opened the cardboard box. Loki stared at the long thin sticks in it. 

“That looks like a torture device.”

“Not really. It goes up. You telling me you’ve never had anything else up there before.”

“No, I haven’t” Loki’s voice raised in utter embarrassment. He did not want to have this conversation. And what's more, he could feel blood running down his legs again.

“You’re a virgin?”

“That’s none of your business! Stop asking questions.” Tony put his hands up. He had unwrapped the tampon and handed it to Loki. Loki looked affronted. “I don’t want to use those. I need to sit down.”

Loki’s stomach was cramping so bad his vision was blurring. Tony caught him and lowered him onto the towel he’d just laid out on the floor. It, and the dressing gown were quickly soaked with blood. 

“I know I’m no expert but isn’t that rather a lot of blood?” Tony asked delicately.

“Not for me, at least I think it’s normal. The other times have been like this too.” Loki was panting, trying to work his way through the pain with his dignity still intact. Tony hummed in response, now unwrapping a pad from its bright crinkly wrapper. 

“Where do you keep your underwear?” Loki went bright red.

“What kind of perverted question is that. Creepy old man.” The last sentence was muttered under his breath.

“No no no. You’ve got it wrong. These sit in your underwear to catch the blood. That’s the only reason why I asked.” Loki grumbled before directing Tony to the top draw in the dresser. Tony came back feeling slightly embarrassed holding a pair of Loki’s boxers. 

He ripped the wrapper off and showed Loki how the back was sticky and could be pressed onto the lining of the pants. Loki took them from his hand, struggling to his feet, refusing Tony's offer of help. He went into the bathroom to change.

While waiting for him Tony wandered over to the kitchen to boil the kettle for the hot water bottle he’d brought. It was nicely warm by the time Loki emerged. Loki was looking even paler than before and his eyes were slightly red giving the impression he’d just been crying. Tony, for once in his life, held his tongue and silently helped Loki to bed.

When he pressed the hot water bottle to Loki’s stomach the God let out a small gasp of pleasure, clutching it closer to him, seeming to all but curl around the soothing warmth.

“Feel better?” Tony asked.

“Yes. How did you know it would help?” Loki was practically purring with delight, he never would have thought to do something like this to relieve the pain.

“It’s just one of those things that you pick up when a lady’s on her period,” He stumbled when he said the word lady, not wanting to upset Loki. “Or you know, a person is menstruating, there are just certain things you do. Hot water bottles one of them. Being extra nice is another. How do you not know this, are things different on Asgard?”

“Things like this aren’t discussed at all. It’s kept between Mothers and Daughters, the information was never passed down to me.”

“Why the hell not.” Tony was outraged.

“They didn’t tell me I was a different species, no way would they have mentioned something so trivial.”

“I didn’t know you were not Asir.” Loki’s face fell. He hadn’t meant to say that. He’d done such a good job of keeping his secret, now Tony had learned all sorts of things today.

“Lokes?” Tony became concerned when Loki zoned out. “Hey, I’m not judging or anything. Do you want me to leave?”

Loki found that he didn’t. Tony’s presence, however normally annoying, was comforting. He shook his head muttering the words; “Please stay.” Under his breath.

“You seem like you’re really new to all this,” Tony said as he perched on the edge of the bed.

“I am.” Loki looked at the blanket rather than at Tony. He felt very vulnerable and he wanted to make Tony understand why he was being so pathetic and weak. “I’ve only bleed five times before and all of those were where the other circumstances were much worse than my cycle. This is the first time I’ve really had to think about what’s happening and to deal with it.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Whatever for? It’s not like it’s your fault.” Loki raised his eyebrow.

“No, I’m sorry that you’ve had to deal with this all on your own. If there's anything I can do to help just let me know.” When Loki looked at him there were unshed tears glistening in his eyes.

Tony stayed until Loki was sleeping, asking Jarvis to keep an eye on him. He then went and sought out Thor. He found him in the entertainment room, on the leather sofa watching some documentary on jellyfish. He looked up when Tony entered the room.

“Friend Tony! How do you fare?” Thor was as enthusiastic and loud as normal.

“I’m good. I’ve got a question?”

“Ask away.” The was still focused on the screen.

“How old is Loki?” This made Thor turn around.

“Why do you ask?” There was a faintly threatening tone in his voice telling Tony that he was in full over-protective big brother mode.

“I was just curious…”

“If you try anything with Loki, I won’t hesitate to put Mjölnir through your head.”

“No no no. Absolutely no. I wouldn’t.” Geez, why was the first thing everyone jumped too when thinking about him? “Honestly Thor, I promise I’d never try anything with your baby brother.”

“Loki is 1056.” Tony had started to walk out of the room when Thor called after him.

“How olds that here?”

Thor thought for a moment, doing calculations in his head. “About 17 perhaps.”

“He’s just a little kid,” Tony muttered under his breath. Thor asked what he’d said. “Nothing. Good night.”

As Tony was walking to his own room for the night he kept thinking about Loki. He really needed someone to look out for him and as Loki didn’t seem to trust his brother at the moment Tony decided that he would have to be that person. That made Tony chuckle, he’d gone from genius billionaire playboy philanthropist to parental figure, first to Peter now to Loki. The last thought he found himself thinking before falling asleep was how he should really introduce Loki to Peter, they’ed be such good friends.

**Author's Note:**

> I do enjoy being mean to poor Loki. Maybe I need a new hobby...?


End file.
